Professional investigation for serious crashes
The most important reason for having a specialized traffic crash investigation unit is to assure a thorough and professional investigation of serious injury or fatal traffic crashes.
Some area police departments in Summit County have invested thousands of dollars and many hours in training their personnel to properly investigate these serious crashes. This training and the skills needed to properly investigate traffic crashes are highly advanced and need to be practiced routinely to maintain proficiency. Additionally, few departments can afford the proper equipment or have the number of serious crashes that will maintain the investment they have made in their crash investigators.
In 2004, crash investigators from several area police agencies began meeting and planning ways to share knowledge, hone skills, maintain training and share resources. Today, this goal is being realized in the Summit Metro Crash Response Team (SMcRT).
Participation in this unit is voluntary and participating agencies reap the benefit of a wide range of resources in both equipment and personnel that would be otherwise unavailable. Those who have trained crash investigators, maintain their agency’s investment in training; those who don’t yet have a crash investigator have ready access to train officers and to call professional investigators to the scene 24/7.